fool pump (was Emergency (sort of))

[neil <neil@xxxxxxxxx>]

First of all, thanks to those who helped, and those that tried,
especially to Dragos for the relay locations, and to the useful Neil for
specific fuel pump testing info. Ron, if my car ever breaks down in the
ghetto of Springfield, Il again, I'll be giving you a call (woulda saved
me 50 bucks if I'd done that this time).

For my fellow E30/M42 owners who might need this info in the future; the
P/N is 16-14-1-181-075, and it does not have the sender with it (they
bolt together). It cost me <gulp> $248, including tax and next day
shipping. The fuel pump relay is on the firewall, just left of center
and to the right of the brake booster, under the black cover the runs
nearly the width of the cowl. It's the center one, and the other two are
the DME, and O2 sensor heater relays.

I got the fuel pump for the 318is Thursday (yes, it was most definitely
the fuel pump), and installed it yesterday. It took about an hour. 20
minutes of actual installation time (including cleanup), and 40 minutes
getting cleaned up and going to the car parts store for a *$#^@ 50 cent
hose clamp, which I almost got with the pump, but thought, "naa, they'll
be fine". Wrong!
Well, it started up instantly, despite the fact that its been sitting
for 2 weeks! I ASSumed that there'd be some air in the fuel lines, but
it didn't even stumble once.

As I was rolling it out of the garage, I was going about 10-12 mph, when
the car jerked to a halt, accompanied by a metallic crunching/scraping
sound, then immediately a SNAP type sound. <oh crap!> My first thought
was that I had left the trunk lid up and it hit my lower loft, or that I
hit the garage door opening with the front of the car (and I'm not even
old yet), but then I remembered that the loft is 10' off the ground, the
trunk was closed, and the front of the car was 3' out the door. Then I
thought that I had somehow hooked the disable freezer that's in my
garage. I jumped out to check, and to my gleeful surprise found that I
had only destroyed a tie down strap, and bent a 3/4" bolt about an inch.
No damage to the car. <whew!> The metallic crunching/scraping sound was
my old lawnmower getting in the way of the strap as I pulled it tight
(it left a thick black mark on the floor from the wheel), and the snap
was the strap breaking.
I had bolted a tie down strap to my garage sill plate, and hooked a
winch (no, not a wench) to the strap, to winch the car into the garage.
I forgot to unhook it.
Before you ask, yes, I tried to push the car into the garage, but it was
10 pm, 40* out, raining heavily on my grass and gravel driveway, which
is on a ~20* incline up to the garage, and the only help I had was from
my dear wife. I even tried (momentarily) to crank it into the garage in
reverse with the starter, but it wouldn't move the car very easily
(aside from being kinda stoopid).

Unfortunately, we don't get to enjoy the fruits of my labor for a few
days more yet, because we took it to the body shop today for repairs
that were scheduled for tomorrow, to repair the rear bumper from when
the loser rearended my wife last month.

'91 318is <-IT'S ALIVE!
'87 325is
'85 318i <-now sporting a Cherry Bomb TurboFlo "muffler" ($15 at
Meijer), and no longer sounds like Mike Wendell's iSpeed '84 318i race
car (cool in car videos BTW!)

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